nickels in the oven

Kind of Like Spitting - In the Red
Released Nov. 1, 2005
on Hush

These songs resonate with the kind of vulnerability of a boy trying to find himself, equipped with just a guitar, some like-minded friends and pages torn from a weathered diary. Only this boy has grown up — or at least gotten older. But his voice still cracks, and he stills sings with the kind of honesty that would make most adults blush.

Singer-songwriter Ben Barnett, 30, has been writing songs and searching for himself since he was a teenager, playing his first show in a metal band at 14. He has long since shifted his focus to folksy, do-it-yourself indie rock.

In the Red, his eighth full-length album, explores a range of emotions and instrumentation. Some songs are just Barnett and his acoustic guitar. Others find him playing the electric guitar backed by a full band. The pace is always changing, and the whole affair is hardly consistent.

Perhaps the label describes it best:

This is an artist that can both invigorate an audience with rare energy then turn around and demand rapturous silence and reflection. This is an artist taking a look in the mirror, wrestling with demons, and after a knock-down drag-out brawl, finding some peace.

The songs are unpolished and imperfect, desperate and unapologetic. You can hear it in the way his voice sometimes sounds like it’s about to break or in the similarly-impassioned guitar playing.

This, of course, is not for everyone. Many will cringe at the description alone. It’s nothing exceptional, really, and I think he has done better. But I have a feeling that he’s doing this for himself.

For an introduction to the artist, I’d recommend Nothing Makes Sense Without It (mp3s: “Blue Period,” “Birds of a Feather“), One Hundred Dollar Room (”26 Is Too Soon“) or Old Moon in the Arms of the New (”Boy Cries Wolf“). Or you can just listen to Barnett’s cover of GZA’s “Labels.” Bet you didn’t see that coming. It’s gettin’ drastic.

Thrice - Vheissu
Released Oct. 18, 2005
on Island

With Vheissu, the members of Thrice refuse to pigeonhole themselves, constrained to the limitations and expectations of a certain sub-genre.

They may not be quite at the level of shape-shifters like Radiohead or Cave In, but Thrice is leagues ahead of most of its Warped Tour contemporaries.

The overall sound has become often atmospheric and experimental. A more melodic direction was hinted at on 2003’s The Artist in the Ambulance, but the expansive, cinematic nature of Vheissu remains unprecedented.

Moody keyboards and ambient electronics lend to a spaced-out, dramatic mood. One song builds from a haunting Japanese music-box melody. Singer-guitarist Dustin Kensrue explains the band’s intentions:

Our biggest goal was to make something different, even if we didn’t know at first exactly what that meant. We just knew we wanted it to be atmospheric and create a space you could kind of live in. Our records have been kind of flat and two dimensional in the past, so we definitely wanted to try to do something more open sounding.

Rolling Stone gave Vheissu just two out of five stars, while Kerrang Magazine gave it a full five. It may be less than perfect, but it is by no means average.

Fans of breakthrough album The Illusion of Safety may be disappointed. Teppei Teranishi’s piercing guitar solos are noticeably absent. The screaming is sparse, and the tempo is often slower. But Thrice has not sold out — just progressed. Call it a reinvention.

A contest that ends in January provides fans with the tracks to lead single “Image of the Invisible” and gives them the chance to reinterpret it. The band also made the entire album available for listening on MySpace.

Thrice donates a percentage of the album’s proceeds to 826 Valencia and is currently on tour with Underoath, The Bled and Veda.

Wolf Parade - Apologies to the Queen Mary
Released Sept. 27, 2005
on Sub Pop

Listen to this album lying in bed alone, staring at the ceiling. Or soon you may hear some of its songs blaring out the speakers as you stumble alongside the hipsters during your local club’s indie dance night.

Wolf Parade’s debut full length thrives in both environments. The album’s closing song captures this duality: “Sometimes we rock and roll. Sometimes we stay at home, and it’s just fine.”

Most of the songs build around keyboard-driven fuzzy melodies, driving percussion and repetitive sing-along choruses. The four members of Wolf Parade may break no new musical ground, but they do it so well. And maybe that’s enough.

Frontmen Dan Boeckner and Spencer Krug share vocal duties, taking turns in the spotlight. Emotive deliveries and ambiguous lyrics abound. As the songs twist, build and howl, you’re left with their images of bus rides and lonely towns, ghosts and bodies.

Almost no review fails to mention that Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brock introduced the band to Sub Pop Records and produced much of this album. Or that the group also lists the Arcade Fire among its friends and comes out of Montreal’s blossoming music scene.

In an interview with cokemachineglow.com, Krug addresses the hype:

I’d like to think we’re good enough to hold peoples’ (sic) attention long enough so they’ll actually listen to the album and come to a show and think about our band outside of [these] terms… I mean, all these different variables add to something, but they have absolutely nothing to do with “the band.”

Wherever you are when you hear this album, set aside your expectations and take it for what it is, regardless of the band’s indie credentials.

Coheed and Cambria - Good Apollo I’m Burning Star IV Volume One: From Fear Through the Eyes of Madness
Released Sept. 20, 2005
on Columbia/Sony

Coheed and Cambria’s progressive rock albums serve as an outlet for the fanciful, epic stories born in the mind of front man Claudio Sanchez.

The lyrics on Good Apollo continue with the saga detailed throughout the band’s first two albums, an intergalactic tale involving a doomed married couple, their children and the fate of humanity.

The band even released a 116-page graphic novel to accompany the CD and further explain the complicated plot, adding to Sanchez’s Bag On Line Adventures comic book series.

Even if you ignore the whole science-fiction aspect of the ambitious band, the songs are well crafted and often both technical and catchy. The music on the album is just as dramatic and detailed as the story, using more strings, keyboards and references to classic rock than before.

I’ve seen Coheed and Cambria three times, one of which they played a double set. I’ll admit that when I bought a ticket for the Tampa date of the band’s upcoming headlining tour, I was more excited about the opening bands: The Blood Brothers, Dredg and mewithoutYou. But it seems that this time around, Coheed is finally taking its grand ideas to the stage for a show worth sticking around for.

In an article on MTV News last month, Sanchez revealed that for this tour the stage show will reflect the storyline:

We’re incorporating set pieces from the graphic novel…We have this huge guillotine with these wings that are going to unfold as the show goes on, outward — kind of like a vampire would. And the blade will come down. It’s going to be awesome.

The tour kicks off tomorrow in Atlantic City, N.J., and wraps up on Nov. 17.

Super Furry Animals - Love Kraft
Released Sept. 13, 2005
on XL/Beggars Group

Mixing sun-drenched pop with psychedelic, progressive rock, Love Kraft may be slightly more straightforward than some of the band’s past albums, but no less imaginative.

Super Furry Animals succeed in capturing the spirit of the music of the late ’60s and early ’70s, adding enough of their own flair to make the resulting sounds their own. Complete with infectious melodies, honey-dipped harmonies and enormous choruses, this is a guitar-heavy opus bent on musical and lyrical adventures.

With consistently innovative records, one reviewer argues that these Welsh genre benders may be the “most important band of the past 15 years.”

This is the Furries’ seventh studio album and the first to feature songs written and sung by four of the group’s five members. Half the songs contain string arrangements thanks to the High Llamas‘ Sean O’Hagan, a long-time collaborator and unofficial SFA member.

The often politically-frustrated band once turned down a seven-figure offer from Coca-Cola for the use of their song in a worldwide commercial. Lead vocalist Gruff Rhys explained the decision in a recent interview:

Ultimately you’ve got to hear your own voice on telly selling a product that you hate, you know? Obviously it would make a big difference financially, but we get to make a living making music, and that’s amazing in itself. We’re holding out for that Red Stripe advert in Jamaica. We could probably stomach that and live happily ever after.

Where do they go from here?

“The future now is wide open and clear,” are the final words on the piano comedown of Love Kraft’s closing track, and the answer is revealed:

Just about anywhere.